This Game is Overrated

[Wolf Kanno]

Do you agree or disagree?

[Colonel Angus]

Disagree.

[The Man]

Disagree.

[Forsaken Lover]

I agree.

If it was better, I would have finished it.

Hell, I finished FFXIII but I didn't finish this game. What does that tell you?

[The Man]

That you have terrible taste in FFs :colbert:

[VeloZer0]

Honestly it depends who is rating it. Some people over rate it, some under rate it. On aggregate I think it does about where it should.

[Psychotic]

I disagree. I don't think it is underrated either though. I think FFVI is rated - quite rightly - very highly by the fans of the series. The open-ended World of Ruin is a fantastic piece of gameplay that I think is unmatched by any other FF. The music is absolutely phenomenal in places as well.

I do think there is something of an inferiority complex from VI fans regarding its status, manifesting itself in dislike towards other games in the series - particularly but not limited to FFVII - which is embarrassing.

[Jiro]

I think Final Fantasy VI is rated as it should be. It is considered one of the strongest entries in the series, and indeed one of the best RPGs ever made.

[Elpizo]

Agreed. It's a good RPG, but no more than that. There are better games, both in the series and outside of it. I didn't see anything jaw-droppingly amazing or astonishingly good when I played it. It was just a good game.

[Ayen]

Anything that gets popular is considered overrated these days. I find it to seldom be the case when one is deemed so and I try to avoid the word.

[Loony BoB]

I tend to feel it is overrated. I feel something is overrated when I go in expecting something amazing based on player feedback and never get that "wow" moment. There are other games out there that did get highly rated and I did get a sense of "wow" from them. I just feel that FFVI doesn't quite reach the heights that it's fans say it reaches, but it isn't a bad game by any means.

I feel that the hype let it down in a big way for me. That is despite me managing my expectations, too - I tend to not get drawn into hype too much.

I think David O'Doherty's song of "Lower Your Expectations" is entirely relevant to people new to this game.

[Jinx]

Eh, I tried playing it and wasn't too impressed. I might give it another go someday.

[Slothy]

That you have terrible taste in FFs :colbert:

Well the guys favourite FF is FFIV so his taste is better said to be schizophrenic I guess. But FFXIII is one of the worst games ever made so liking it more than FFVI is just very strange.

But anyway, no, FFVI is not overrated. It is one of the best games in the series and one of the best JRPG's out there. What it did well, it did extremely well, it overcame the limits of the cartridge format like very few RPG's ever did, the one world aspect of the World of Ruin is still fairly unique to the genre, and many of the things later FF's get credit for popularizing started there.

It's one weakness is the battle system which suffers from poor balancing. But it's certainly playable and most of the battle systems in the series suffer from the same problem.

[metagloria]

Overrated. Not even the best of its era (V > VI).

(Still great though!)

[Carl the Llama]

I think certain people overrate it, but then I see people (not as many to be sure) underrate it as well... it isn't high on my list of favourite final fantasy games, I mean I played it before I was subjected to all the hype the internet gave it (which was only when I invariably read the hype concerning VII) I am pleased I managed to play the game before I was subjected to it, otherwise my opinion of it would have been negatively coloured by it.

That said, I think it's a great game, but honestly, I don't rate it even in my top 3 final fantasy games.

[Pike]

As everyone else has said I think it's rated just about right. Personally it's not one of my top three favorite FFs, it might be fourth though. (if it's not fourth, it's fifth.) Regardless, it's still very, very good.

[Jinx]

Of the six FFs I've completed/played a significant amount of, VII probably rates third. It's a decent game, but not the best in the series. But again: I definitely can see why people still love it if only for the nostalgia. I still enjoy the hell out of it although not as much as I used to (just played it too many times).

[NeoCracker]

I always thought it was a bit awkward that while it was one of my favorite FF games, it started what was one of the worst trends that continued on through FF VII and VIII, that being the games innate ability to allow you to use any character for any role you feel like, even though you have a party of 13 unique characters, kind of minimizing the point of having all those options.

[Kalevala]

Overrated. Not even the best of its era (V > VI).

Alright, come on now.

[Loony BoB]

Overrated. Not even the best of its era (V > VI).
Alright, come on now.
I actually agree with Gloria on that one. I'm a massive fan of FFV, it's just fun the whole way through, gameplay-wise and script-wise.

[metagloria]

Overrated. Not even the best of its era (V > VI).
Alright, come on now.
I actually agree with Gloria on that one. I'm a massive fan of FFV, it's just fun the whole way through, gameplay-wise and script-wise.
Ha! Gloria.

But I agree with your supportive assessment. :cool:

[Mirage]

I agree.

If it was better, I would have finished it.

Hell, I finished FFXIII but I didn't finish this game. What does that tell you?

To not ask you for opinions on games :colbert:

[Forsaken Lover]

How wude! /Jar Jar


Seriously, this game is supposed to be orgasmically fantastic. If you listen to people online, every game after is a pale shadow of its greatness and you'd need to add up all the best elements of VII-XII just to get something half as good as VI was.

I didn't see that.

[Jessweeee♪]

I sort of think it's overrated. Not that it isn't great, I just don't think that it's especially better than the other FF titles as many would have me believe. I greatly enjoyed FFVI, but I think there are many other titles in the series that are just as good or better.

The trend seems to be that online fan communities rank FFVI as the best whereas everyone I talk to IRL prefers FFVII or FFIX.

[Slothy]

If you listen to people online, every game after is a pale shadow of its greatness and you'd need to add up all the best elements of VII-XII just to get something half as good as VI was.

I have honestly never actually heard anyone say that.

[Bolivar]

It was a kick-ass RPG and did have a few jaw-dropping moments for me. It was one of the few games to make me tear up, so I do feel its general reputation, on the aggregate, is well-earned.

From its dedicated fans, not so much. I don't know why they still, to this day, take it so personal that it's overshadowed by FFVII and it's impact on gaming. For whatever reason they nonetheless insist the game is better, or more important, than it actually is. I also personally enjoyed FFV more.

FFVI is a masterpiece but it's not Top 5 in the series. It's not even Top 5 for SNES RPGs.

[Elpizo]

Overrated. Not even the best of its era (V > VI).
Alright, come on now.
I actually agree with Gloria on that one. I'm a massive fan of FFV, it's just fun the whole way through, gameplay-wise and script-wise.

I'll third this. Had way more fun with V than with VI.

[Dat Matt]

I played it recently. It's pretty okay.

To be honest, I managed to miss pretty much EVERYTHING about this game. I knew some bits and pieces but I generally didn't know anything about it other than it was a fan favourite. After playing it I kind of see why. I much rather prefer the Modern FF games, but from the retro perspective I like it the best.

[Slothy]

From its dedicated fans, not so much. I don't know why they still, to this day, take it so personal that it's overshadowed by FFVII and it's impact on gaming. For whatever reason they nonetheless insist the game is better, or more important, than it actually is. I also personally enjoyed FFV more.

Considering how much you oversell FFVII's quality and impact on gaming it's not surprising you have some difference of opinion with FFVI fans. :p


It's not even Top 5 for SNES RPGs.

Now you're just talking crazy.

[Bolivar]

From its dedicated fans, not so much. I don't know why they still, to this day, take it so personal that it's overshadowed by FFVII and it's impact on gaming. For whatever reason they nonetheless insist the game is better, or more important, than it actually is. I also personally enjoyed FFV more.

Considering how much you oversell FFVII's quality and impact on gaming it's not surprising you have some difference of opinion with FFVI fans. :p

Granted, but in my defense, it seems like the majority of the community has a difference of opinion with FFVI fans.



It's not even Top 5 for SNES RPGs.

Now you're just talking crazy.

:)

It's true.

[NeoCracker]

From its dedicated fans, not so much. I don't know why they still, to this day, take it so personal that it's overshadowed by FFVII and it's impact on gaming. For whatever reason they nonetheless insist the game is better, or more important, than it actually is. I also personally enjoyed FFV more.

Considering how much you oversell FFVII's quality and impact on gaming it's not surprising you have some difference of opinion with FFVI fans. :p

Granted, but in my defense, it seems like the majority of the community has a difference of opinion with FFVI fans.


There was also a time most people thought this was better then Led Zepplin.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kE0pwJ5PMDg

And there was that time Titanic became the highest grossing movie of all time.

Or that period of time Vanilla Ice was the most popular and successful rapper when he came out.

You are in good company I'm sure. :p

[Forsaken Lover]

What's wrong with Titanic?

[NeoCracker]

What's wrong with Titanic?

...Other then it clearly belongs no where near the top of list of highest grossing movies of all time?

[Colonel Angus]

VI is hardly overrated. VII on the other hand...

[Wolf Kanno]

There was also a time most people thought this was better then Led Zepplin.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kE0pwJ5PMDg

And there was that time Titanic became the highest grossing movie of all time.

Or that period of time Vanilla Ice was the most popular and successful rapper when he came out.

You are in good company I'm sure. :p

c4OYtuzTcmk

I don't know man, it had a good club mix. :D

[Pumpkin]

I don't think so. Honestly from the overall opinions I've, seen its loved, but not super-loved like VII for example, so its rated just about right I would say.

[Jibril]

i agree yuo cant even call airstrikes in tihs game

[maybee]

Final Fantasy VI ?

Overrated ?


No, because depending on who you hang out with, some people have never even played it or have played it, and have turned their nose up on it like a snob because of the aged graphics.


How can it be overated when some of the fandom, refuse to play the game and experience it's wonder ?

[Yellow_Magic]

Overrated relative to what? Other FF games, or other jRPGs?

[Carl the Llama]

Final Fantasy VI ?

Overrated ?


No, because depending on who you hang out with, some people have never even played it or have played it, and have turned their nose up on it like a snob because of the aged graphics.


How can it be overated when some of the fandom, refuse to play the game and experience it's wonder ?

You could say the same about FFVII.

[The Man]

Not really. The amount of people who haven't played FFVII pales in comparison to the amount of people who haven't played FFVI. Not to mention that FFVII's graphics (at least in their original form; the PC version's patches admittedly mitigate this somewhat) actually do look bad, while FFVI's have aged quite well.

[Psychotic]

One day I'm going to see an FFVI fan praise their favourite game without having to resort to trying to put FFVII down in comparison, and it'll be a beautiful moment. Look, regardless of which one is better, FFVII is the more popular and influential game. More people will say it is better. It will always be so. Get over it.

You're like the guy who has a crush on a girl but she's going out with some other guy. "But but but he's an alcoholic and a jerk and has REALLY BAD GRAPHICS and I'm such a NICE GUY don't you see?" Well, here's the news: Despite his flaws, she still wants the alcoholic over you, you weenie. How about you stop fixating over what's wrong with the other guy and start talking about your strengths instead you big manchild?

It depresses me that the FFVI fanboys are worse than the Sephiroth fanboys they despise so much. Beware that, when fighting monsters, you yourself do not become a monster. FFVI fans, you are the monster now. Pull your trout together, you're besmirching the good name of one of my favourite FFs. :colbert:

[Pike]

Or that period of time Vanilla Ice was the most popular and successful rapper when he came out.

Dude no you do not diss Vanilla Ice

[The Man]

Psy you do realise it's mostly not FFVI fans who brought up FFVII in this thread, right? But if someone talks about FFVII (and for that matter, in Carl's case, openly admits to its flaws) I'm damn well going to state my own opinion.

[NeoCracker]

One day I'm going to see an FFVI fan praise their favourite game without having to resort to trying to put FFVII down in comparison, and it'll be a beautiful moment.

You know, when the first person to bring up FF VII in this thread was you saying this...



I do think there is something of an inferiority complex from VI fans regarding its status, manifesting itself in dislike towards other games in the series - particularly but not limited to FFVII - which is embarrassing.

I can't help but feel you be trollin' here. :p

[Psychotic]

It's been going on for much longer than just this thread. :greenie: This telling off is the product of years of pent up eye rolling.

[The Man]

just saying, if you really wanted that rant to hit home for people you could have waited to place it in a thread where it actually described what was happening in that thread

[Psychotic]

Nah, I feel better now. :) Thanks though!

[Carl the Llama]

Not really. The amount of people who haven't played FFVII pales in comparison to the amount of people who haven't played FFVI. Not to mention that FFVII's graphics (at least in their original form; the PC version's patches admittedly mitigate this somewhat) actually do look bad, while FFVI's have aged quite well.

I actually disagree, sure the graphics aren't top notch, but I have no problem what so ever playing the game in its original form, I am actually doing so right now (albeit through an emulator) and honestly I couldn't complain, the pre rendered backgrounds have a certain charm and the battle screen looks excellent.

I also disagree that VI has aged well, for one I tried to get my brother interested in VI and he tried... but couldn't play it for long before giving up, citing that he just couldn't adjust to the graphics (he is a bit of a graphics whore) where as he completes VII VIII and IX without moaning about their graphics.

All seriousness aside, the fact that people the world over are still asking for a remake for a game made over 17 years ago still holds the truest, FFVII IS the most popular Final Fantasy out there, and no amount of but this and why that is going to change it.


Final Fantasy VII is one of the best-selling games of all time, with the highest sales (10.5 million copies) of any game in the Final Fantasy series, and the second highest sales for a game on the PlayStation platform. It received GameSpot's Editor's Choice, scoring a 9.5/10 and a 9.6/10 user score. Since its debut on the Sony PlayStation, Final Fantasy VII has been released on the PC and the PlayStation Network. It is widely considered one of the most influential RPGs to-date.

Any way you look at it VII is the most popular FF which is why whenever you get threads like these, the fans who think their game is better invariably seem to compare VII to theirs, pointing out the various "flaws" VII seems to have, while bigging their game up.

[The Man]

As has already been pointed out numerous times in this thread, most popular does not mean best. If most popular were best then presumably Kenny G would be the best jazz artist and Justin Bieber would be the best pop artist. I'm sure we all know that's not true.

Emulating FFVII really can't be compared to the original graphics of the game because there are all kinds of filters that increase the resolution and otherwise improve the appearance of the game. The original polygon graphics look terrible. The pre-rendered backgrounds and FMVs are the only unaltered parts of the original game that have aged well. Even then they are trounced by FFVIII and particularly FFIX's (which are rivalled by Chrono Cross' as some of the best of the 32-bit era).

It sounds like your brother simply doesn't appreciate good sprites. As far as 16-bit graphics go FFVI's were some of the best of the era. A few games like Chrono Trigger and Seiken Densetsu 3 could be considered to have improved on them (they were also released a year after FFVI) but they certainly were better looking than anything that had come before them.

And I could easily turn the remake argument around to suggest that in recognising the game has a lot to gain from a remake they acknowledge its flaws by suggesting that there are things to be improved upon. :monster: That said there certainly is no shortage of people wanting a FFVI remake as well. One thread speculating on the possibility here received thirteen pages, and it's hardly the only one to have plenty of people expressing desire for one.

[Carl the Llama]

As has already been pointed out numerous times in this thread, most popular does not mean best. If most popular were best then presumably Kenny G would be the best jazz artist and Justin Bieber would be the best pop artist. I'm sure we all know that's not true.

True, but I didn't say best, I said most popular. The term best can however be determined by the fact that GameFAQs held a poll (admittedly it was held in 2002 and only includes the first 10 games) and FFVII came out top (X came second and VI came third) the poll received over 38k votes and can be found here (http://www.gamefaqs.com/poll/762).


Emulating FFVII really can't be compared to the original graphics of the game because there are all kinds of filters that increase the resolution and otherwise improve the appearance of the game. The original polygon graphics look terrible. The pre-rendered backgrounds and FMVs are the only unaltered parts of the original game that have aged well. Even then they are trounced by FFVIII and particularly FFIX's (which are rivalled by Chrono Cross' as some of the best of the 32-bit era).

Again, that's just your opinion, my brother played my original copy of VII on his PS3 and never a mention was made about him complaining about the graphics... you say only the pre rendered background and FMVs have aged well... thats 90% of the graphics lol, and the in battle sprites look great.


It sounds like your brother simply doesn't appreciate good sprites. As far as 16-bit graphics go FFVI's were some of the best of the era. A few games like Chrono Trigger and Seiken Densetsu 3 could be considered to have improved on them (they were also released a year after FFVI) but they certainly were better looking than anything that had come before them.

They were some of the best for that era, but that in no way constitutes they have held up against the test of time, sprite are dated. and we aren't judging by what came before, we are judging if they have aged well, and the simple fact that there are people who would give up on a chance to play this excellent game because of their graphics shows that they haven't aged well.


And I could easily turn the remake argument around to suggest that in recognising the game has a lot to gain from a remake they acknowledge its flaws by suggesting that there are things to be improved upon. :monster: That said there certainly is no shortage of people wanting a FFVI remake as well. One thread speculating on the possibility here received thirteen pages, and it's hardly the only one to have plenty of people expressing desire for one.

No, I honestly don't think you could. I (and many other fans) have said why we want a remake, and that's because we love the game and would dearly love a remake so we can see it by todays standard... many have said they just want a graphical update, no changes other then seeing it in glorious HD.

The simple fact that people have been making threads about a remake for VII and the fact that there is a stickied thread about it in this very forum (because it used to crop up soooo often) just goes to show how popular it is.

[The Man]

>implying that the votes of GameFAQs users have anything to do with "best"
that's just another form of popularity contest

I could just as easily say that the Metacritic scores of FFVI, FFIX, FFXII and CT being higher than the Metacritic score of FFVII shows that they're better games, but I'm not that kind of petty individual.

The pre-rendered backgrounds and FMVs are not "90%" of the graphics. You spend easily half the game staring at the character renders. They look atrocious. The comparison with sprites isn't applicable at all: FFVI's graphics remain some of the best sprite graphics in history. Dismissing an entire graphic style because some people find it "dated" is not the same as dismissing graphics that have been easily eclipsed by better examples of the same graphic style. FFVII looks like shit compared to FFIX. FFVI does not look like shit compared to Chrono Trigger or Suikoden II. Comparing FFVI's graphics to FFVII's is an apples to oranges comparison. Comparing FFVII's to FFIX's, or FFVI's to those of any modern sprite game, is not.

There are people who want FFVII remade so they can fix glaring flaws with the game other than its graphics. Even people who like the game, for example, generally admit that the translation we got was an atrocious clusterfuck that created unnecessary ambiguities in the story and renders parts of the game almost incomprehensible. The fact that Square felt they had to clarify so much of the game with five dozen (note: this is hyperbole) Ultimanias and similar indicates that they themselves realised they screwed up. If the game stood on its own, they probably wouldn't feel it needed so much clarification. Granted, arguments could be made (and in fact I have made them in some cases) that the clarifications often actually made the original game worse, but regardless, the storytelling in some cases is sloppy and the translation is much worse.

And again: an argument from popularity is no testament to actual quality.

[Ayen]

I still have my hard copy of VII for the PlayStation. I played the game on a 40 inched wide-screen TV. The graphics didn't bother me. The polygons didn't bother me. Which is more than I can say for Final Fantasy VIII where my eyes needed a moment to adjust. The first time I played VI the sprites and graphics on that didn't bother me either. Both games have aged just fine through the years in spite of their limitations at the time. But if you didn't like the polygons or the sprites the first time around then chances are you never will. The majority of VII fans don't give a damn how bad the polygons look, at least not to the point where it would stop them from playing the game. The same goes for any of the flaws VI may have to a fan of the game. And if you're talking strictly visuals you're never going to agree. The best games I have ever played had graphics that would be considered absolute trout by today's standards, and I would take them over any of the games with superb graphics that somehow manages to only offer half of what the former does.

[blackmage_nuke]

i agree yuo cant even call airstrikes in tihs game

Yes you can (http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=XSoHSGRyNPo#t=988)

I think this game deserves the rating it gets

[Carl the Llama]

>implying that the votes of GameFAQs users have anything to do with "best"
that's just another form of popularity contest

I could just as easily say that the Metacritic scores of FFVI, FFIX, FFXII and CT being higher than the Metacritic score of FFVII shows that they're better games, but I'm not that kind of petty individual.

You could, but then you would be mistaken, FFVI, FFVII, FFXII and CT all get a Metacritic score of 92%, I just checked. Aside from that the term "best" is subjective, for you it means quality, to me it means game that has the highest rating by the fans of said games. I would also point out that metacritic is based upon the scores of the 20 critic reviews out there published by companies, companies that have a limited number of peoples opinions, where as the poll I provided had many voices, and in the opinion of those people (the gamers) FFVII is the best, simple as. Sure its a matter of opinion on how you define the word best but you could say that about anything, to me the majority wins out, that is how I define the word, so by default to me FFVII IS the best.


The pre-rendered backgrounds and FMVs are not "90%" of the graphics. You spend easily half the game staring at the character renders. They look atrocious. The comparison with sprites isn't applicable at all: FFVI's graphics remain some of the best sprite graphics in history. Dismissing an entire graphic style because some people find it "dated" is not the same as dismissing graphics that have been easily eclipsed by better examples of the same graphic style. FFVII looks like trout compared to FFIX. FFVI does not look like trout compared to Chrono Trigger or Suikoden II. Comparing FFVI's graphics to FFVII's is an apples to oranges comparison. Comparing FFVII's to FFIX's, or FFVI's to those of any modern sprite game, is not.

Ok so you really want to stress this fact, I just googled a random review of FFVII from 1997 and can you guess what it said? This:


What is necessary during the game's normal progression is the capacity for awe. FF7's graphics are light years beyond anything ever seen on the PlayStation, making Wild Arms look like a Yarouze demo (we have nothing against Wild Arms, but FF7 is that good). The game begins in an enormous industrial complex housed in a futuristic city, and remains there for the first seven or eight hours of play. Just when it appears that the entire game will take place in the city, the venue changes to a fully 3D, fully rotatable engine, and players will find that the city is a mere dot on the enormous world map.

Nothing about how horrendous the polygons look, "awe inspiring" pretty much say it all. Arguing about a games graphics is like arguing how a steak looks, when you should be arguing about the taste. Taking into the fact that the game started development in 1994 when the PSone was brand new speaks pretty much for itself.

Then lets consider the graphics of FFIV V and VI:

http://i.imgur.com/tyN4DDr.png
http://i.imgur.com/EEzMTJF.png
http://i.imgur.com/A7SoB5B.jpg

And now CT:

http://i.imgur.com/znAFT25.jpg

I don't know about you, but I consider CTs graphics far superior to graphics from VI. And when considering FF snes games alone, I would actually say V trumps VI in terms of graphics. But hey, that's just my opinion.


There are people who want FFVII remade so they can fix glaring flaws with the game other than its graphics. Even people who like the game, for example, generally admit that the translation we got was an atrocious clustersmurf that created unnecessary ambiguities in the story and renders parts of the game almost incomprehensible. The fact that Square felt they had to clarify so much of the game with five dozen (note: this is hyperbole) Ultimanias and similar indicates that they themselves realised they screwed up. If the game stood on its own, they probably wouldn't feel it needed so much clarification. Granted, arguments could be made (and in fact I have made them in some cases) that the clarifications often actually made the original game worse, but regardless, the storytelling in some cases is sloppy and the translation is much worse.

Would you give me some examples of these so called "glaring flaws" and "almost incomprehensible" because I never encountered such while I was playing.

[Sephiroth]

It is overrated. It deserves to get much love but is only even more popular because it is cool to hate other popular things, the anti-hype-hype.


More importantly and incontrovertibly, the sheer number of people who didn't get, for example, that the "Sephiroth" the party follows for the first disc is a clone (as demonstrated by browsing any Final Fantasy-related message board about ten years ago) attests to poor storytelling.



What you don't get is that he isn't a clone and the Final Fantasy VII you think of never existed and also was not retconned in that way. Just as people don't know what canonicity means nowadays. Or the incredible number of people that ignore flat-out stated facts.

[Wolf Kanno]

So it begins...

http://media2.giphy.com/media/5zkLai9w9GJnW/giphy.gif

[metagloria]

And when considering FF snes games alone, I would actually say V trumps VI in terms of graphics. But hey, that's just my opinion.

Nope, it's also my opinion. One of the many reasons I think V is a better game than VI.

[Carl the Llama]

And when considering FF snes games alone, I would actually say V trumps VI in terms of graphics. But hey, that's just my opinion.

Nope, it's also my opinion. One of the many reasons I think V is a better game than VI.

You do know trumps means better... right? I was saying V has better graphics then VI.

[metagloria]

And when considering FF snes games alone, I would actually say V trumps VI in terms of graphics. But hey, that's just my opinion.

Nope, it's also my opinion. One of the many reasons I think V is a better game than VI.

You do know trumps means better... right? I was saying V has better graphics then VI.

So was I. In response to you saying "that's just my opinion", I said "Nope, it's also my opinion." Like, agreeing with you.

[Pumpkin]

I wish people could appreciate any game without comparing it to others (I have comparison issues).

Okay well maybe not that, it is okay to compare to have a discussion, but basing how good of a game something is based off of another game is a bit silly. A game should stand on its own merits. Not "X is a better game because it has better ____ than Y"

I prefer VI to VII and would pick it any day of the week. But honestly the games don't even remind me of each other. If anything, I might say VI is underappreciated because I'd heard of games like VII, VIII, IX, X, XII, but I'd heard almost nothing about VI until I joined a forum revolving around the series. And its a good game. It has good characters, it has an interesting story, it has decent gameplay, it has a type of humour I can appreciate, I enjoyed playing it. I'm honestly surprised I didn't hear more about it.

[Bolivar]

And when considering FF snes games alone, I would actually say V trumps VI in terms of graphics. But hey, that's just my opinion.

Nope, it's also my opinion. One of the many reasons I think V is a better game than VI.

You do know trumps means better... right? I was saying V has better graphics then VI.

So was I. In response to you saying "that's just my opinion", I said "Nope, it's also my opinion." Like, agreeing with you.

Also wrong, it's all our opinions! (ie, me too)


As has already been pointed out numerous times in this thread, most popular does not mean best. If most popular were best then presumably Kenny G would be the best jazz artist and Justin Bieber would be the best pop artist. I'm sure we all know that's not true.

There's a world of difference between a well-marketed pop star finding an audience at the time of release and the sober appraisal of a video game 20 years later. You're fighting a war that's been over for many years.

[The Man]

You could, but then you would be mistaken, FFVI, FFVII, FFXII and CT all get a Metacritic score of 92%, I just checked. Sorry, I meant Gamerankings. FFVII has 92.35% (http://www.gamerankings.com/ps/197341-final-fantasy-vii/index.html), FFIX has 92.72% (http://www.gamerankings.com/ps/197338-final-fantasy-ix/index.html), FFXII International has 93.00% (http://www.gamerankings.com/ps2/939426-final-fantasy-xii-international-zodiac-job-system/index.html), FFIII for SNES has 93.96% (http://www.gamerankings.com/snes/554041-final-fantasy-iii/index.html), Chrono Trigger has 95.64% (http://www.gamerankings.com/snes/563538-chrono-trigger/index.html). So according to Gamerankings FFVI is the best entry of the series and Chrono Trigger is better than any of them. I would actually put Chrono Trigger tied with FFVI and would rank FFV higher than FFVII (although it may have had a chance at being so if it had actually been released here in 1992), but regardless.


Aside from that the term "best" is subjective, for you it means quality, to me it means game that has the highest rating by the fans of said games.That's nice. You do realise that the GameFAQs poll doesn't necessarily mean that FFVII would be the highest-ranked FF by fans of said games, right? It could just mean that the most people have played it. There is nothing in the GameFAQs poll forcing everyone who votes on it to actually be familiar with all of the entries on the list, and judging from the average GameFAQs poster, most of them aren't.


I would also point out that metacritic is based upon the scores of the 20 critic reviews out there published by companies, companies that have a limited number of peoples opinions, where as the poll I provided had many voices, and in the opinion of those people (the gamers) FFVII is the best, simple as. Sure its a matter of opinion on how you define the word best but you could say that about anything, to me the majority wins out, that is how I define the word, so by default to me FFVII IS the best.Again, Kenny G isn't the best jazz artist of the last 30 years. This is a stupid metric for determining the best.

Game reviewers are professionals who evaluate each game on the merits. Their opinion isn't perfect but it's a hell of a lot more reliable than a popularity contest with the unwashed masses.


Nothing about how horrendous the polygons look, "awe inspiring" pretty much say it all. Arguing about a games graphics is like arguing how a steak looks, when you should be arguing about the taste. Taking into the fact that the game started development in 1994 when the PSone was brand new speaks pretty much for itself.My argument has never been that they looked bad at the time. It is that they haven't aged well. So well done for pulling up a review that does nothing to address my criticisms, I guess?


I don't know about you, but I consider CTs graphics far superior to graphics from VI. And when considering FF snes games alone, I would actually say V trumps VI in terms of graphics. But hey, that's just my opinion.Yes when you anti-alias one graphic and don't anti-alias the others it looks better, well done for figuring that out. You also didn't pick a particularly representative screenshot from FFVI. Look at something like Mt. Koltz and tell me it looks worse than the environments in FFV.


Would you give me some examples of these so called "glaring flaws" and "almost incomprehensible" because I never encountered such while I was playing.This is nothing we're going to agree on, but for me the game dipped severely in quality after the party left Midgar and fell further after the first disc. More importantly and incontrovertibly, the sheer number of people who didn't get, for example, that the "Sephiroth" the party follows for the first disc is a clone (as demonstrated by browsing any Final Fantasy-related message board about ten years ago) attests to poor storytelling.


There's a world of difference between a well-marketed pop star finding an audience at the time of release and the sober appraisal of a video game 20 years later. You're fighting a war that's been over for many years.Yes, well, as I revealed, "sober appraisal" of video games as revealed by Gamerankings suggests that FFVI won. Which metric you use for determining "best" has a lot to do with what outcome you get, and the number of people who are nostalgic for a game they played seventeen years ago is no less a popularity contest than record sales figures.

[Forsaken Lover]

Looking at that site, Xenogears only has a score of 90.99 (http://www.gamerankings.com/ps/199365-xenogears/index.html)

So the site is saying FFVII and IX are better than Xenogears.

Nope.jpg

[Kalevala]

Overrated. Not even the best of its era (V > VI).
Alright, come on now.
I actually agree with Gloria on that one. I'm a massive fan of FFV, it's just fun the whole way through, gameplay-wise and script-wise.

The story, characters, and soundtrack are all pretty unremarkable compared to a lot of other entries in the series. I agree the job system is a pretty cool feature, but I also remember having to grind an unpleasant amount to really take advantage of it. It all felt rather tedious to me, not fun.

[Jiro]

Metacritic is a dubious resource, fyi.

[The Man]

Looking at that site, Xenogears only has a score of 90.99

So the site is saying FFVII and IX are better than Xenogears.

Nope.jpg
It seems to be commonly agreed that the second disc of Xenogears is a complete waste of space that utterly squandered the potential of the story, so I'm ok with this.


Metacritic is a dubious resource, fyi.I'm referring to Gamerankings, but I kind of agree, just blindly adhering to its judgements as a measure of quality is stupid. It's a more reliable indicator than a freaking GameFAQs poll, though.

Regarding FFV, the music and battle system are nice, but the characters and plot are definitely inferior to those of other entries in the series. Often underrated, but obviously nowhere near the level of FFVI, FFVII, or FFIX's. It rises above FFVII in my rankings for other reasons.

[Forsaken Lover]

The second disk of Xenogears had several of the best moments in the game.

[Carl the Llama]

It's a more reliable indicator than a freaking GameFAQs poll, though.

I don't see how its more reliable then a poll, its a simple case of you saying "He gets paid to play and write reviews so his opinion is more valued then that of the unwashed masses" such as myself and many other fans of said games.

I never trust a game magazine/internet article for reviews, simply because they get paid to write their reviews, I mean I would rather take the voice of the fans (albeit with a pinch of salt) then a single person, because many voices would generally agree that a game is good, but if you take the opinion of a single source you can never be sure if their opinion is valid. For an example I cite that Playstation Official Magazine US gave Final Fantasy XIII 5/5 rating... (which is included in its Gameranking valuation) the simple fact that these people get paid to promote the games, the fans pay out money to play the game, then give their honest opinion on the matter via a gamer review or a poll, of course you get people who write up a bad review on a game simply because someone says their game is better for example I can choose these 2 reviews:

http://www.gamefaqs.com/ps/197341-final-fantasy-vii/reviews/review-135648
http://www.gamefaqs.com/ps/562865-final-fantasy-vi/reviews/review-146235

Both are clearly made by fanbois, but on the whole I would think the fans are the more trustworthy sources of scoring a game they some company that gets paid to do so.

You are of course, entitled to your opinion and nothing I can say will change your mind about it, just as nothing you can say or do will change my mind that FFVII is the premier final fantasy out there.

[The Man]

I don't trust online polls as measures of a game's (or other medium's) quality because there is no way of knowing whether they were scientific (i.e. whether steps were taken to prevent people from freeping (http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=freep) the poll), whether the people who vote on them are familiar with all the games they're voting on, etc. Theoretically doing something like a Rate Your Music approach should help to minimise this problem somewhat but it's well known that people game those sites with negative votes for albums they never listened to so their favourite albums can get top ranking for the year. There really is no effective way to survey a large number of people about their opinions of media's quality because people lie on surveys.

And while it's true some reviewers seem to take money to review crap positively there are plenty of people who balance it out. FFXIII's score on Gamerankings is a comparatively dismal 84.15%. I generally find review score aggregates to be more reliable indicators of quality than polls of users, although there are exceptions.

That said, people can be wrong about things for a long time after they were released anyway. Moby-Dick is widely known as a classic now but it wasn't discovered as such until after World War I, literally sixty years after it was written. Contemporary reviews were scathing.

[Spooniest]

*sucks in big breath*

I absolutely vehemently detest the terms "overrated" and "underrated" because they dodge the real question in any entertainment situation: is the game any good? It's like saying you don't like pizza because everyone around you is eating it. It makes one suspect that you're doing it more for the attention you can get by saying it than trying to judge the quality of the object in question.

*lets out breath*

That said, FFVI has to be appreciated as a product of its time. Comparing it to FFV isn't fair; FFV was NOT OUT in the states at the time. And comparing it to FFVII is equally unfair: FFVII was produced on much more advanced hardware and came on three flippin' discs, fer cryin' out loud. FFVII wallops it, for sure, but it wouldn't exist without it.

I feel like the Joker: look, listen. I really want to get this point across so I'm going to reiterate it; asking whether FFVII is better than FFVI is fruitless and counter-productive. FFVII is FFVI's baby!!! Like I'm serious, FFVI got married to the PlayStation and the child they had was FFVII!

If FFVII and FFVI were people, and you were all telling FFVI that its child had surpassed it, there would be only one irrevocably inevitable reaction from FFVI: PRIDE.

FFVI fans should be proud as all smurfing trout of FFVII because it was the offspring of the game before it.

Now stop it! I said stop it! Don't make me come down there! :)

NinjaEdit: As for the question of Graphics...

Ugh. Since when do graphics = good game? Anyone still holding onto that ancient religion needs to have their head examined.

I reiterate one more time: FFVII is the better game, but it owes absolutely everything to VI before it, as each FF owes a debt to the one before it that can never be repaid.

[NeoCracker]

Firstly your entire point rests on the assumption that FF VII is the better game. Just because it came out better on better technology doesn't make it the better game.

Secondly, there are so many problems with the parent metaphor that I don't even want to get into that one. XD

Finally, it's not about graphics, at least not entirely. It's about Aesthetic appeal, (I will always hold that art design trumps high end graphics myself, but that's beside the point.) FF VII's character models have aged badly and look pretty clunky. FF VI's have aged much better. However FF VII is clearly the graphical power house by comparison. (Mind you, I do just mean the character models, a lot of the backrounds and locations do look great, as well as the FMV's have aged well.)

Given the visual nature of a video game, the aesthetics are very much a valid point to bring up. You are, after all, constantly looking at the visuals your entire play through, this is going to have an effect on your opinion.

[Pumpkin]

I think we should try and accept that different people have different opinions on games and realize that when you have 2 quality games (yes, I'm not a huge fan of VII but I'll admit its a quality game) its hard to find one that's objectively better. Heck, I'm sure you could find arguments to back up your claim on both sides and find sites with polls to back up both sides because neither one is objectively better than the other. Its not like one of them is regarded as a terrible creation that should never have existed like that E.T. game where one is very clearly better (although I'm sure someone out there feels that way about either game) so really it comes down to which is subjectively better in your own opinion. And what's really the point in arguing that.

I love IX more than any other game in existence. The only game that comes close in Majora's Mask. No other game, no matter how much I like them, is even remotely close to taking the top spot for me. Did VII sell better than IX? Absolutely. It sold a heck of a lot better. Are there a ton of polls saying that VII is better? Yes, and I would have no problem finding a whole ton of them. TO ME VII will never be better than IX. It just won't. It doesn't even come close. Trying to convince me otherwise is a pointless waste of time because my opinion won't change.

I don't have a problem with people saying "I think VI is better than VII because blah blah" or vice versa, but when you try and make it seem like its objectively better and not subjective in your own opinion, its a little bit insulting. Its basically telling people they're wrong about how they feel and what they think. Let people like what they like.

:ffvilaugh:

[Fynn]

It isn't. It is one of the most solid titles in the series. It deserves its love.

[maybee]

This thread


http://31.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lw7qn58NxG1qii6tmo1_500.gif

[Jibril]

this thread is 5 pages long and not a single one of you have actually compared anything aside from graphics, review scores, sales, and gamefaqs polls of all things

[Mirage]

What's wrong with Titanic?

I don't get the titanic hate either. Main reason I never watched it again is just that it is so fucking long.

[WildRaubtier]

There is a single thing VI does well - it has superb production values, is probably the finest crafted jRPG on the SNES, and definitely set the bar for the rest of the series. If you insist on comparing it to VII, then there's three points you almost certainly need to consider:

1) They both have approximately the same production values;
2) VI was developed towards the end of the SNES' shelf life, with an extensive library of games by Square behind it;
3) VII was developed at the beginning of the PS' life, and was their second title (first RPG) for that system.

VI and VII essentially have pretty much the same flaws when it comes to quality. That only means that VII is less forgivable, for reasons of experience and technological potential. You can argue about which looked better or sounded better all you want, though everyone's tastes are different and no point is made by doing so.

---

Apart from that craftsmanship, though, there isn't much VI actually does well. To address the main points people like to say make this the best title in the series:

The story: strangely devoid of plotholes for a Final Fantasy title.

The (playable) characters: all but a couple are incredibly shallow and irrelevant to the story (due to interchangablility, part of the game design), having little development outside of their time in the spotlight during their initial recruitment as well as their re-recruitment during the World of Ruin. The three optional characters, Mog, Umaro and Gogo, have essentially nothing. Of the development the characters do see, none of it is irretrievably tied to the setting of VI, thus all but Terra can easily be transplanted into another game and lose nothing for it.

Example: Locke wants to protect Aeris from the Turks because he was unable to protect Rachel earlier. Later, he finds the Phoenix materia and unsuccessfully tries to revive her. Cyan is a slight stretch, Strago & Relm have some stake in the setting, but change them to Ancients/Summoners/Al Bhed etc. and you're good.

Comparing VI to V is fine, but you oughtn't fall into the trap of comparing V's story to anything. It's good, but only in the context of an excuse plot, being remarkable only for being very aware of that fact (later less successfully attempted in X-2). My favourite description of V's story:


FFV's story is literally this:

One time a tree hated people so much he became an evil wizard
But four warriors defeated him and sealed him away
But he got out and now you have to defeat him
Also your dad's best friend was a werewolf.

V is definitely a superior game to VI, even considering the craftmanship and story of the latter, and it's overwhelmingly based on the comparison of gameplay of the two. The gameplay of VI is completely, utterly vapid. Set character classes were a regression even when VI was new (fun fact I just realised typing this: NES era FFs were more progressive than SNES era FFs), and the sheer number of characters and immense freedom in party building are at best a poor-man's version of V's job system.

Even considering most FFs before and since could be broken by some basic means, there remains no actual reason in VI to break the system. Compare to 8, which no one is going to dispute has the most breakable system in the series, can be powergamed to the max and you'll still need to find a way to deal with Omega Weapon. VI's answer to this is simply asking you to surrender control of your characters, and those who disliked XII because of the Gambits system will be quick to tell you how horrible having a game play itself is.

TL;DR yes VI is overwhelmingly overrated.

[The Man]

VI and VII essentially have pretty much the same flaws when it comes to quality. That only means that VII is less forgivable, for reasons of experience and technological potential.FFVI has one advantage that FFVII does not have, which is that it is, as you yourself acknowledged, surprisingly devoid of plot holes or sloppy storytelling for a Final Fantasy title. As I have already once pointed out, the fact that so many people fail to understand basic plot points of VII prove that VII's storytelling is subpar.


The (playable) characters: all but a couple are incredibly shallow and irrelevant to the story (due to interchangablility, part of the game design), having little development outside of their time in the spotlight during their initial recruitment as well as their re-recruitment during the World of Ruin. The three optional characters, Mog, Umaro and Gogo, have essentially nothing. Of the development the characters do see, none of it is irretrievably tied to the setting of VI, thus all but Terra can easily be transplanted into another game and lose nothing for it.I don't see how this is exactly a weakness, or at least a weakness that is unique in the series to FFVI, because the same can be said of most characters in other FF games.

FFVI's gameplay is acknowledged even by fans of the game to be weaker than FFV's but it is not weaker than the gameplay of nearly every main series entry that came after it (FF Tactics and FFX-2 excluded). Plenty of other games that followed had the same problem with characters being interchangeable in battle. FFIX had the opposite weakness in regressing to FFIV's class system. Square didn't want to repeat themselves using the same battle system for every game so while it might have been nice for every game to have a battle system as sophisticated as FFV's that was never going to happen.


VI's answer to this is simply asking you to surrender control of your charactersThis only ever happens in the Colosseum, which is a mini-game most people never even bother with. Apart from that, the only characters who "play themselves" are Gau, Mog, and Umaro, and in the former two cases that's only if you select specific commands (they can still use magic and items like any other character).

I also like how you acknowledge that FFVI "is probably the finest crafted JRPG on the SNES" and then go on to call it "overwhelmingly overrated". Given that even most people who like the game acknowledge its flaws, I fail to see how this applies.



this thread is 5 pages long and not a single one of you have actually compared anything aside from graphics, review scores, sales, and gamefaqs polls of all thingsActually I had already mentioned FFVII's sloppy storytelling.

[WildRaubtier]

Your first point is easy to address: "not bad" does not equal "good."

Re your second point: its a weakness because the characters are a major reason listed when people say why they like this game, often in relation to the story. When your characters aren't driven by, or even related to the overarching story, then perhaps that's an overestimation of the quality of the storytelling, don't you think? An "overrating," if you will.

Anyone who thinks that the gameplay of VI isn't the weakest of the series, possibly bar IV, is kidding themselves. It's better compared to jRPGs in general in that regard. That you can pick and choose what characters and therefore what classes you have access to, weakens it further in regards to the other more traditional jRPGs in the series which force your hand. You can say whether you like the Materia system or Junction system or Gambit system all you like, or how broken they are, but those systems have depth, whereas VI has none.

We had this talk about the Colosseum the other day, too. Regardless of how insignificant it is, it's all the endgame content offered by VI, and is a pathetic excuse for not offering an actual reason to use the full extent of VI's endgame.

You've misinterpreted what I mean by being well crafted - you could have a well crafted stick, for example, with all manner of intricate details carved into it, but what does that stick offer that others don't? VI has the prettiest parts, but none of the additions that make it worthwhile above any other stick, so to speak. Your ornate stick is overrated because people are suggesting it has dohickeys which it doesn't. Let's compare VI to XIII, yet another very ornate stick, but one that is (rightfully?) lambasted.

And for your final point - so you think VI is good and VII is shit. Good for you. Personally, I'd never compare something I held as highly as you hold VI by spending every breath on the subject exclaiming how beautiful it is compared to a pile of shit, as you so often do. :monster:

[The Man]

Re your second point: its a weakness because the characters are a major reason listed when people say why they like this game, often in relation to the story. When your characters aren't driven by, or even related to the overarching story, then perhaps that's an overestimation of the quality of the storytelling, don't you think? An "overrating," if you will.As I stated, this is a weakness of the series as a whole. Every single character in FFVII apart from Cloud and possibly Aerith has the same problem, for example, and nearly every character in FFIX has the same problem. You are singling out FFVI for this because you don't like it.


Anyone who thinks that the gameplay of VI isn't the weakest of the series, possibly bar IV, is kidding themselves.Not even close.


That you can pick and choose what characters and therefore what classes you have access to, weakens it further in regards to the other more traditional jRPGs in the series which force your hand.Apart from entries like FFVII and FFIX and FFX, the latter of which allows you to swap out characters in the middle of battles.


You can say whether you like the Materia system or Junction system or Gambit system all you like, or how broken they are, but those systems have depth, whereas VI has none.The Materia system is just the Esper system with the bells and whistles rearranged. The sphere grid is literally a linear progression until the end of the game (apart from in the international version). And I could go on. Not to mention that FFVI's characters are not interchangeable until such point as it is possible to gain enough AP to teach them all the spells, which, unless you do troutloads of grinding, won't be possible until the second half of the game.


We had this talk about the Colosseum the other day, too. Regardless of how insignificant it is, it's all the endgame content offered by VI, and is a pathetic excuse for not offering an actual reason to use the full extent of VI's endgame.Lambasting FFVI for having a shallow side quest is like lambasting FFVII because some of the minigames are stupid. No one is playing the game because of the endgame. FFVI has tons of optional content that is easily among the best of the series, and it allows a sense of freedom in its latter half that, as I have pointed out in the past, is unrivalled amongst the series.


You've misinterpreted what I mean by being well crafted - you could have a well crafted stick, for example, with all manner of intricate details carved into it, but what does that stick offer that others don't? VI has the prettiest parts, but none of the additions that make it worthwhile above any other stick, so to speak. Your ornate stick is overrated because people are suggesting it has dohickeys which it doesn't....no one is suggesting that though? People acknowledge the battle system isn't the strong point of the game. There is a six page thread about how people would fix it. However, an RPG is much more than the battle system. Some people value the other parts of the game much more than you do.


And for your final point - so you think VI is good and VII is trout.No, you're misinterpreting me. FFVII is my fourth or fifth favourite game in the series. That's far from being "trout". I'd give FFVII a rating of about 85% or 90% to FFVI's 98%. This is in comparison to something like FFII or FFXIII which would probably get around a 60% from me.

[WildRaubtier]

Re your second point: its a weakness because the characters are a major reason listed when people say why they like this game, often in relation to the story. When your characters aren't driven by, or even related to the overarching story, then perhaps that's an overestimation of the quality of the storytelling, don't you think? An "overrating," if you will.As I stated, this is a weakness of the series as a whole. Every single character in FFVII apart from Cloud and possibly Aerith has the same problem, for example, and nearly every character in FFIX has the same problem. You are singling out FFVI for this because you don't like it.
The playable cast of VII are all incredibly driven by a history of abuse at the hands of the Shinra, and most of them have a direct connection to a top ranking employee. Barret lacks the relationship, but happens to be the leader of a major resistance group. Cait Sith is the Shinra. Yuffie and Cid have the weakest reasons, but Cid manages to lampshade the majority of the VI cast when he joins your party ("You guys are going against the Shinra? What the hell, sign me up!").

You're also very wrong about IX. Dagger and Vivi are incredibly invested in the events of the story, whist Zidane, Steiner and Eiko all drive the story with their parts in the setting. Only Amarant and Quina resemble the VI cast in that they join you to fill out the roster and then have some minor character building later that is irrelevant to the story as a whole.

Apart from Terra, Celes, and perhaps Edgar, the characters in VI have no actual ties to the Empire, and about as many suffer any direct injustice from the same, if at all. Shadow, Sabin, Gau, Setzer, Strago, Relm, Mog, Umaro and Gogo each have neither of these elements, which you may recognise as being over 60% of the playable cast. The stories of these characters (those that have them, anyway) relate only to themselves or other ancillary characters and therefore can be transplanted into other settings with literally no loss to context.



Anyone who thinks that the gameplay of VI isn't the weakest of the series, possibly bar IV, is kidding themselves.Not even close.
Feel free to support this statement at some point, by all means.



That you can pick and choose what characters and therefore what classes you have access to, weakens it further in regards to the other more traditional jRPGs in the series which force your hand.Apart from entries like FFVII and FFIX and FFX, the latter of which allows you to swap out characters in the middle of battles.
The only other traditional jRPGs are FF and IV - the former which makes you pick four classes to play the entire game with, and the latter which changes your cast as the story demands. VII, IX and X are all irrelevent to the statement you're quoting here.



You can say whether you like the Materia system or Junction system or Gambit system all you like, or how broken they are, but those systems have depth, whereas VI has none.The Materia system is just the Esper system with the bells and whistles rearranged. The sphere grid is literally a linear progression until the end of the game (apart from in the international version). And I could go on. Not to mention that FFVI's characters are not interchangeable until such point as it is possible to gain enough AP to teach them all the spells, which, unless you do troutloads of grinding, won't be possible until the second half of the game.
The abilities your characters have in VII are entirely dependent on the Materia you have equipped, including the potency of those abilities or when they may activate. In VI, each character has a two sets of abilities, including one list that depends on what Magicite you equipped in the past. There is only a single, non-sharable ability that depends on what Magicite is equipped at that time. The difference is so fundamental that describing it as "a rearrangement" is deceitfully simplistic, if not entirely incorrect.

You're on the right track about the Sphere Grid, which is 100% a linear progression until it's only 90% a linear progression. X's customisability comes primarily from Weapon and Armour customisation, not the Sphere Grid.

By "interchangable" I mean that you can choose who goes with you at will. Chalk that up to a misunderstanding.



We had this talk about the Colosseum the other day, too. Regardless of how insignificant it is, it's all the endgame content offered by VI, and is a pathetic excuse for not offering an actual reason to use the full extent of VI's endgame.Lambasting FFVI for having a shallow side quest is like lambasting FFVII because some of the minigames are stupid. No one is playing the game because of the endgame. FFVI has tons of optional content that is easily among the best of the series, and it allows a sense of freedom in its latter half that, as I have pointed out in the past, is unrivalled amongst the series.
No other game has as many characters, nor a story event that causes them to become isolated from each other without a compulsory reunion. Apart from those character building quests (the developments from which are mostly trumped during the normal story progression of other titles), you're left with an endgame content consisting of 8 Dragons, the Mage Tower, and the Colosseum. The first two of those can be powergamed into challengeless time wasters, leaving only the Colosseum. I'll further this point below.



You've misinterpreted what I mean by being well crafted - you could have a well crafted stick, for example, with all manner of intricate details carved into it, but what does that stick offer that others don't? VI has the prettiest parts, but none of the additions that make it worthwhile above any other stick, so to speak. Your ornate stick is overrated because people are suggesting it has dohickeys which it doesn't....no one is suggesting that though?
The dohickeys in this case is the story. I've listed some arguments as to why the story isn't as good as people assert, and you've failed to respond to those points other than to say "other games have this problem too."


People acknowledge the battle system isn't the strong point of the game. There is a six page thread about how people would fix it. However, an RPG is much more than the battle system. Some people value the other parts of the game much more than you do.
Arguing that the primary focus of a game shouldn't be gameplay is ridiculous. Visuals, music and story by themselves only to a movie or, at best, a visual novel. VI is not a visual novel, it is a jRPG, a genre which includes gameplay. If you have poor gameplay, then you almost certainly fail to have a good game, regardless of how well any other aspect performs. The Colosseum is the only endgame content worth a damn in VI and it more closely resembles the tower defense genre, not a jRPG.



And for your final point - so you think VI is good and VII is trout.No, you're misinterpreting me. FFVII is my fourth or fifth favourite game in the series. That's far from being "trout". I'd give FFVII a rating of about 85% or 90% to FFVI's 98%. This is in comparison to something like FFII or FFXIII which would probably get around a 60% from me. [/theman][/quote]
Consider me fooled. Though I see you edited your rating of VI down from 100% (https://www.dropbox.com/s/p66k9ib4iedomv8/2014-05-11%2015.44.06.png), good move for your credibility there :monster:

[Pumpkin]

Am I the only one who doesn't think IV had weak gameplay?

[Wolf Kanno]

Am I the only one who doesn't think IV had weak gameplay?

No. It may not have heavily customizable gameplay like later entries but it also can't be broken like them either. The dungeons also challenged the player with false directions, handicaps, floor traps, and hidden enemies. Honestly I feel it is one of the most solid games in the franchise, it's just that modern gamers expect bells and whistles and don't want to be hampered by clever dungeon design.

[Spooniest]

IV's gameplay can be described as rather 'thin' compared to other entries. But the same could be said of the first game, the seventh game, and the tenth. Seeing a pattern?

They were all the first game on that system...there's always an adjustment period with new hardware, or so I am inclined to think.

V's Job system is superior to VI's esper system. I'd grant that. But what it has in terms of gameplay it seems to sacrifice in storytelling. I never cared for the story and no argument for it has ever seemed compelling to me. It comes off as a low-calorie version of a usual FF story.

[WildRaubtier]

Like I alluded to earlier, V has an excuse plot and it's perfectly aware of it.

But that's fine, it doesn't need one.

[NeoCracker]

Most of the FF VI cast though does have a relationship to the Empire.

Terra - Imperial Slave Doll/magic experiments.
Celes - Imperial General turned traiter
Edgar and Sabin - Their Kingdom is in a misleading treaty with the Empire, and they are consipiring with Rebel forces to oust the empires control.

Cyan - His entire kingdom, including wife and kids, were poisened and killed at the hands of Kefka during the war between the two countries.

Strago and Relm - Their introductary arc is there connection to the plot.

Locke - Member of the rebels, as well as the Imperials marching through his home caused his girlfriend to go all coma like.

Gau, Umaro, Mog, and Gogo are the only ones without any real connection to the empire of the cast.

So yeah, the majority of the FF VI cast is pretty invested in the fight against the empire.

Also, in terms of mechanics, FF VI is pretty solid. Not amazing, but solid. On paper, a game like FF X may have the best of the main series battle systems, but it's execution makes the game so laughably easy that there isn't really a need to make use of any of what it has to offer, so I can't bring myself to really enjoy it all that much, so I can't really rate it higher then FF VI in terms of gameplay.

There are the optional boss's, but those are such a small fragment of the game it hardly makes up for the rest of the game. Even VI, being an easy game as it is (Not so much when I first played it, mind you, I was still learning the RPG ropes around this time. :p), takes a bit more thought to progress then X did. It may not have had the quality design of X's system, but the execution was much better handled.

Finally, this is a thread were we have basically started comparing one game to another. So it's perfectly valid to point out that all the games we are comparing have the same problem, as bringing up that problem in one specific game does nothing to advance the argument, as it does nothing to advance one side forward. :p

P.s. FF X and VIII are really the only games in the series I can think of that do a bad job at keeping all of the characters directly connected to the issues surrounding the main plot (And to a smaller extent V, and I and III didn't really have characters, at least not until III DS.)

[Pumpkin]

I didn't like X's battle system except for the character swapping.

[Spooniest]

Like I alluded to earlier, V has an excuse plot and it's perfectly aware of it.

But that's fine, it doesn't need one.

I think it needs one...but you're entitled to your opinion.

[The Man]

The playable cast of VII are all incredibly driven by a history of abuse at the hands of the Shinra, and most of them have a direct connection to a top ranking employee. Barret lacks the relationship, but happens to be the leader of a major resistance group. Cait Sith is the Shinra. Yuffie and Cid have the weakest reasons, but Cid manages to lampshade the majority of the VI cast when he joins your party ("You guys are going against the Shinra? What the hell, sign me up!").

You're also very wrong about IX. Dagger and Vivi are incredibly invested in the events of the story, whist Zidane, Steiner and Eiko all drive the story with their parts in the setting. Only Amarant and Quina resemble the VI cast in that they join you to fill out the roster and then have some minor character building later that is irrelevant to the story as a whole.

Apart from Terra, Celes, and perhaps Edgar, the characters in VI have no actual ties to the Empire, and about as many suffer any direct injustice from the same, if at all. Shadow, Sabin, Gau, Setzer, Strago, Relm, Mog, Umaro and Gogo each have neither of these elements, which you may recognise as being over 60% of the playable cast. The stories of these characters (those that have them, anyway) relate only to themselves or other ancillary characters and therefore can be transplanted into other settings with literally no loss to context.Cracker already addressed much of this, but I'll add that Freya in FFIX is also completely ancillary to the story and effectively disappears from the plot once her arc is disappeared. Setzer has suffered under the Empire because his business interests have been suppressed (although this was not noted in Woolsey's original translation), Stragos and Relm have their hometown torched by the Empire, and Shadow is betrayed and left for dead on the Floating Continent. So your assertion that FFVI's cast is any more irrelevant to the plot than FFVII's or FFIX's is in fact completely inaccurate, particularly since three of the characters you cite as being irrelevant are optional characters. The only required character with no serious connection to the Empire or Kefka is Gau.


Feel free to support this statement at some point, by all means.I did. And I didn't even get into mentioning FFII's gameplay which is by far the worst of that of the numbered entries.


The only other traditional jRPGs are FF and IV - the former which makes you pick four classes to play the entire game with, and the latter which changes your cast as the story demands. VII, IX and X are all irrelevent to the statement you're quoting here.Perhaps you could be clearer on your definition of "traditional JRPG" then, because alongside Dragon Quest and Shin Megami Tensei, Final Fantasy is pretty much the JRPG series.


The abilities your characters have in VII are entirely dependent on the Materia you have equipped, including the potency of those abilities or when they may activate. In VI, each character has a two sets of abilities, including one list that depends on what Magicite you equipped in the past. There is only a single, non-sharable ability that depends on what Magicite is equipped at that time. The difference is so fundamental that describing it as "a rearrangement" is deceitfully simplistic, if not entirely incorrect.This would be a much more important distinction if FFVII were not so easy that most players will only need to do this for about three battles of the game. This is admittedly a criticism that applies to nearly all of the post-FFV entries, but the fact is that most players will rarely, if ever, need to switch out their characters' abilities for each other's. Most times I've played FFVII I've only swapped materia out two or three times at most.


You're on the right track about the Sphere Grid, which is 100% a linear progression until it's only 90% a linear progression. X's customisability comes primarily from Weapon and Armour customisation, not the Sphere Grid.Which I might note is a trait it shares with FFVI; characters' effectiveness is wildly altered by weapons, armour, and relics. Relics are, in fact, a prototype for the materia system.


By "interchangable" I mean that you can choose who goes with you at will. Chalk that up to a misunderstanding.And... this isn't a trait shared by many other entries in the series? I'm not even sure what your point is with most of this now.


No other game has as many characters, nor a story event that causes them to become isolated from each other without a compulsory reunion. Apart from those character building quests (the developments from which are mostly trumped during the normal story progression of other titles), you're left with an endgame content consisting of 8 Dragons, the Mage Tower, and the Colosseum. The first two of those can be powergamed into challengeless time wasters, leaving only the Colosseum. I'll further this point below.The entire series can be powergamed into challengeless time wasters if you want, including the "difficult" entries like FFIV. One time time I played FFV I powered through by grinding all my characters to level 99 in the second world and teaching them all the jobs. The game was trivially easy when I did that, but I don't complain that all the challenge is removed by doing that because I'm not a pedant. If you play the game the way it was intended to be played it's no less challenging than most of the later entries in the series.


The dohickeys in this case is the story. I've listed some arguments as to why the story isn't as good as people assert, and you've failed to respond to those points other than to say "other games have this problem too."I haven't bothered presenting any other assertions because I don't agree that having characters with their own focus is a flaw. When you have an ensemble cast, it is almost inevitable that some of them will have more connection to the plot than others do, and FFVI's cast is much more focused than, say, Chrono Cross' or any of the Suikodens'.


Arguing that the primary focus of a game shouldn't be gameplay is ridiculous. Visuals, music and story by themselves only to a movie or, at best, a visual novel. VI is not a visual novel, it is a jRPG, a genre which includes gameplay. If you have poor gameplay, then you almost certainly fail to have a good game, regardless of how well any other aspect performs. The Colosseum is the only endgame content worth a damn in VI and it more closely resembles the tower defense genre, not a jRPG.Well it's a good thing that the gameplay of a JRPG isn't exclusively limited to its battle system then, isn't it? It's not like the only thing you ever do in JRPGs is fight enemies. That would get boring quickly. FFVI has some of the best dungeon design and puzzles in the series and the side quests are pretty much up to the calibre of Chrono Trigger's. Furthermore, while the combat system itself is simplistic, it's fairly well balanced until you get Osmose (which admittedly, alongside the Offering and Gem Box, is completely broken), with a well designed difficulty curve, and the game does a mostly excellent job of teaching you to play it, to an extent that several other entries in the series could have learned from. It also has better replay value than many other entries in the series, due to the sheer number of party combinations (literally billions of them for the final dungeon) and the fact that taking different characters to various parts of the game reveals different aspects of the story.


Am I the only one who doesn't think IV had weak gameplay?
It's nice for its time but hasn't aged well. Luckily other aspects have aged much better.

[WildRaubtier]

Most of the FF VI cast though does have a relationship to the Empire.

Terra - Imperial Slave Doll/magic experiments.
Celes - Imperial General turned traiter
Edgar and Sabin - Their Kingdom is in a misleading treaty with the Empire, and they are consipiring with Rebel forces to oust the empires control.

Cyan - His entire kingdom, including wife and kids, were poisened and killed at the hands of Kefka during the war between the two countries.

Strago and Relm - Their introductary arc is there connection to the plot.

Locke - Member of the rebels, as well as the Imperials marching through his home caused his girlfriend to go all coma like.

Gau, Umaro, Mog, and Gogo are the only ones without any real connection to the empire of the cast.

So yeah, the majority of the FF VI cast is pretty invested in the fight against the empire.

You've missed the point entirely. Terra and Celes both have a fundamental relationship to the empire, and their personal stories are used to drive the plot forward. Edgar does as well, but it's wafer thin. Sabin, however, is literally the brother of another cast member who lives in the mountains. You can move him to a different game, making minor tweaks for context, and neither his story nor that of VI would change.

Locke, for example:
He wants to protect Aeris because he was unable to protect Rachel. Later, he finds the Phoenix materia but is unable to revive her.
He wants to protect Dagger because he was unable to protect Rachel. Later, he finds the phoenix pinion but is unable to revive her.
He wants to protect Yuna because he was unable to protect Rachel. Later, he finds the phoenix fayth but is unable to revive her.

Or Cyan:
His family is killed during the attack on Trabia Garden. He is soon given the chance to say goodbye properly at [VIII doesn't have a weird spiritual place, lets say the phantom forest is in Winhill now].
His family is killed during Sin's attack on Kilika. He is soon given the chance to say goodbye at the Farplane.

In each of these examples, the character's story is not diminished by being moved to a different setting, nor is the story of VI diminished by their absence. This is true for almost all of the cast of VI. The reason is because they lack that key personal reason why they hate the Empire. Locke could be antagonised just as easily by the Shinra, Galbadia, Alexandria and his motivations don't change at all.


Finally, this is a thread were we have basically started comparing one game to another. So it's perfectly valid to point out that all the games we are comparing have the same problem, as bringing up that problem in one specific game does nothing to advance the argument, as it does nothing to advance one side forward. :p

It's a thread about the quality of VI versus how people perceive it. Saying that a problem isn't a problem because it's a common problem doesn't actually support any suggestion that its not a problem. Compare to support, don't compare to show how something else is wrong, too.



Like I alluded to earlier, V has an excuse plot and it's perfectly aware of it.

But that's fine, it doesn't need one.

I think it needs one...but you're entitled to your opinion.

Games having more than an excuse plot is an entirely recent trend. Does Mario need a reason to jump on all these platforms? Let's just say he has to rescue the princess.

[The Man]

Sabin, however, is literally the brother of another cast member who lives in the mountains.Except that their father was murdered by the Empire. Pretty important motivating factor.


Locke, for example:
He wants to protect Aeris because he was unable to protect Rachel. Later, he finds the Phoenix materia but is unable to revive her.
He wants to protect Dagger because he was unable to protect Rachel. Later, he finds the phoenix pinion but is unable to revive her.
He wants to protect Yuna because he was unable to protect Rachel. Later, he finds the phoenix fayth but is unable to revive her.

Red XIII:
He bears a grudge against the Empire because it ran experiments on him.
He bears a grudge against Garland and Kuja because he was an experiment of the Terrans.

As I said, this complaint could be made against nearly any character in nearly any entry in the series.


It's a thread about the quality of VI versus how people perceive it. Saying that a problem isn't a problem because it's a common problem doesn't actually support any suggestion that its not a problem. Compare to support, don't compare to show how something else is wrong, too.As I've said, your assertion that a story is weakened because the characters are not inextricably linked is not supported by anything other than "because I say it is". This is pretty much a necessary feature of all but the most tightly knit ensemble casts, and it's not the sort of thing you get in a video game.


Games having more than an excuse plot is an entirely recent trend. Does Mario need a reason to jump on all these platforms? Let's just say he has to rescue the princess.No, but FFII and FFIV certainly had a lot more than excuse plots, so FFV having an excuse plot is a bit of a step backwards.

[WildRaubtier]

Cracker already addressed much of this, but I'll add that Freya in FFIX is also completely ancillary to the story and effectively disappears from the plot once her arc is disappeared. Setzer has suffered under the Empire because his business interests have been suppressed (although this was not noted in Woolsey's original translation), Stragos and Relm have their hometown torched by the Empire, and Shadow is betrayed and left for dead on the Floating Continent. So your assertion that FFVI's cast is any more irrelevant to the plot than FFVII's or FFIX's is in fact completely inaccurate, particularly since three of the characters you cite as being irrelevant are optional characters. The only required character with no serious connection to the Empire or Kefka is Gau.
Would Strago and Relm's plots change if it were the Shinra who burnt down their village? Would the plot of VI change if Strago and Relm weren't present for the burning of Thamasa?
Would Shadow's story change if he were left for dead by the Galbadian army? Would the story of VI change if no one was left for dead?
Would Setzer's motivations change if his business was being suppressed by the temple of Yevon? Would the actions of the Empire change if Setzer's business hadn't been suppressed?

All of these are "No" and equate to somewhat poor storytelling.

And, well, why shouldn't optional characters be mentioned? VII's Yuffie and Vincent are motivated against the Shinra, though the former fails the transplant test I've been spruiking.


And I didn't even get into mentioning FFII's gameplay which is by far the worst of that of the numbered entries.
Nice opinion. II's system has some depth no matter how unpopular it is.



The only other traditional jRPGs are FF and IV - the former which makes you pick four classes to play the entire game with, and the latter which changes your cast as the story demands. VII, IX and X are all irrelevent to the statement you're quoting here.Perhaps you could be clearer on your definition of "traditional JRPG" then, because alongside Dragon Quest and Shin Megami Tensei, Final Fantasy is pretty much the JRPG series.
**in the numbered FF series. Sorry I Thought That Was Obvious.

But since you asked I'm defining a traditional jRPG system as one where the characters have a set class and abilities to match.


This would be a much more important distinction if FFVII were not so easy that most players will only need to do this for about three battles of the game. This is admittedly a criticism that applies to nearly all of the post-FFV entries, but the fact is that most players will rarely, if ever, need to switch out their characters' abilities for each other's. Most times I've played FFVII I've only swapped materia out two or three times at most.
A lack of need to use the depth of the Materia doesn't detract from that depth. Though you're right that it's a somewhat common, large flaw with the gameplay.


Relics are, in fact, a prototype for the materia system.
Relics are excessive equipment slots. There's barely a dozen that do anything that normal equipment won't, and half of those even are simply "act multiple times in one turn." Not even close to what Materia accomplishes.



By "interchangable" I mean that you can choose who goes with you at will. Chalk that up to a misunderstanding.And... this isn't a trait shared by many other entries in the series? I'm not even sure what your point is with most of this now.
The context is story-wise. VI is designed to have any character say a line based on where the story is at with their own little twist somewhere between Cyan's Ye Olde English and Gau's Tarzan speak. These placeholder lines are mostly sparse in VII, almost entirely absent in IX and completely unneeded by X.


The entire series can be powergamed into challengeless time wasters if you want, including the "difficult" entries like FFIV. One time time I played FFV I powered through by grinding all my characters to level 99 in the second world and teaching them all the jobs. The game was trivially easy when I did that, but I don't complain that all the challenge is removed by doing that because I'm not a pedant. If you play the game the way it was intended to be played it's no less challenging than most of the later entries in the series.
You still would've had Shinryu and Omega. Even VII, with its I Win button (KnightsofRound) requires some thought regarding materia (commonly achieved via Mime) as the WEAPONs are more than capable of outright slaughtering you between uses otherwise, no matter how much grinding you've done. Even VIII, with the reputation has for being incredibly broken, gives you Omega Weapon. The simple fact is that VI has no extraordinary enemies like these.


I haven't bothered presenting any other assertions because I don't agree that having characters with their own focus is a flaw. When you have an ensemble cast, it is almost inevitable that some of them will have more connection to the plot than others do, and FFVI's cast is much more focused than, say, Chrono Cross' or any of the Suikodens'.
I agree entirely. However, not having a focus and not having relevence are two different things. It's besides the point, however. When I hear about how great VI is, it's typically attributed to the story and the characters. The latter is a dubious claim at best and outright false at worst. That would mean that VI is "overrated," which is the scope of this thread.

I often hear lots of good things about Suikoden (I've only been able to play Tierkreis). The characters are never one of those things.


Well it's a good thing that the gameplay of a JRPG isn't exclusively limited to its battle system then, isn't it? It's not like the only thing you ever do in JRPGs is fight enemies. That would get boring quickly. FFVI has some of the best dungeon design and puzzles in the series and the side quests are pretty much up to the calibre of Chrono Trigger's.
It's still a major aspect of the genre - VI is not an exploration game.


Furthermore, while the combat system itself is simplistic, it's fairly well balanced until you get Osmose (which admittedly, alongside the Offering and Gem Box, is completely broken), with a well designed difficulty curve, and the game does a mostly excellent job of teaching you to play it, to an extent that several other entries in the series could have learned from.
Entirely false. The best characters to use are uncontestably Edgar, Sabin and Cyan. Their damage output far exceeds that of anyone else. Not even VIII compares to this level of brokenness (mostly because any character can be broken in it).

[WildRaubtier]

Sabin, however, is literally the brother of another cast member who lives in the mountains.Except that their father was murdered by the Empire. Pretty important motivating factor.
Murdered by PSICOM, does his story change?


Red XIII:
He bears a grudge against the Empire because it ran experiments on him.
He bears a grudge against Garland and Kuja because he was an experiment of the Terrans.

As I said, this complaint could be made against nearly any character in nearly any entry in the series.
That isn't key to Red XIII's plot at all. He also has a direct relationship with Hojo, however wafer thin. Though, yes, he still pretty much fails the transplant test.



It's a thread about the quality of VI versus how people perceive it. Saying that a problem isn't a problem because it's a common problem doesn't actually support any suggestion that its not a problem. Compare to support, don't compare to show how something else is wrong, too.As I've said, your assertion that a story is weakened because the characters are not inextricably linked is not supported by anything other than "because I say it is". This is pretty much a necessary feature of all but the most tightly knit ensemble casts, and it's not the sort of thing you get in a video game.Addressed above.


Games having more than an excuse plot is an entirely recent trend. Does Mario need a reason to jump on all these platforms? Let's just say he has to rescue the princess.No, but FFII and FFIV certainly had a lot more than excuse plots, so FFV having an excuse plot is a bit of a step backwards.[/QUOTE]
From a storytelling point, yes. But absolutely no one will argue that V's story comes off as anything other than "fun," at best.

[The Man]

Would Strago and Relm's plots change if it were the Shinra who burnt down their village? Would the plot of VI change if Strago and Relm weren't present for the burning of Thamasa?
Would Shadow's story change if he were left for dead by the Galbadian army? Would the story of VI change if no one was left for dead?
Would Setzer's motivations change if his business was being suppressed by the temple of Yevon? Would the actions of the Empire change if Setzer's business hadn't been suppressed?Would Red XIII's story change if it was the Empire who experimented on him? Would Final Fantasy VII's plot change if he weren't experimented on?
Would Freya's story change if she were dropped into any other Final Fantasy game?


All of these are "No" and equate to somewhat poor storytelling.You are almost certainly literally the only person in this thread that thinks this is poor storytelling. If the characters have realistic characterisation (which they do), do realistic things (which they do in the context of FFVI's world), and have realistic reasons for doing the things that they do, then faulting them because they could be inserted into other stories with the same motivations is completely arbitrary. I've never heard anyone fault a story for this before. It's something that, as far as I can tell, you made up.


And, well, why shouldn't optional characters be mentioned? VII's Yuffie and Vincent are motivated against the Shinra, though the former fails the transplant test I've been spruiking.Because it's rare for optional characters to be held to the standards the other characters are. It's obvious they didn't even try to make Mog, Umaro, or Gogo serious characters, so holding their lack of seriousness against them is faulting the game for something it never intended to accomplish.


Nice opinion. II's system has some depth no matter how unpopular it is.
There are more important things than your opinion of "depth". Having a character attack themselves to make themselves stronger is literally the dumbest thing in the numbered series (well, before XIII anyway).


**in the numbered FF series. Sorry I Thought That Was Obvious.Well duh.


But since you asked I'm defining a traditional jRPG system as one where the characters have a set class and abilities to match.So... FFIX isn't a traditional JRPG by this definition? While they gain abilities as the game progresses, their class is set.


Relics are excessive equipment slots. There's barely a dozen that do anything that normal equipment won't, and half of those even are simply "act multiple times in one turn." Not even close to what Materia accomplishes.I said it was a prototype for the system, not that it was as expansive as the system.


The context is story-wise. VI is designed to have any character say a line based on where the story is at with their own little twist somewhere between Cyan's Ye Olde English and Gau's Tarzan speak. These placeholder lines are mostly sparse in VII, almost entirely absent in IX and completely unneeded by X.There are plenty of cases where having different party members changes the dialogue. While it's true that there are more placeholder lines than other games, this is most likely a necessity due to the limitations of the SNES.


You still would've had Shinryu and Omega. Even VII, with its I Win button (KnightsofRound) requires some thought regarding materia (commonly achieved via Mime) as the WEAPONs are more than capable of outright slaughtering you between uses otherwise, no matter how much grinding you've done. Even VIII, with the reputation has for being incredibly broken, gives you Omega Weapon. The simple fact is that VI has no extraordinary enemies like these.Until, as I pointed out in chat, the Advance version. It's likely from the presence of CzarDragon in the ROM data of the SNES version that one was intended but unable to be inserted due to time limitations.

And I played Shinryu and Omega and had almost no difficulty with them either.


I agree entirely. However, not having a focus and not having relevence are two different things. It's besides the point, however. When I hear about how great VI is, it's typically attributed to the story and the characters. The latter is a dubious claim at best and outright false at worst. That would mean that VI is "overrated," which is the scope of this thread.Except that you haven't actually established any reason for the characters being "weak" apart from an arbitrary standard that plenty of other people do not share.


I often hear lots of good things about Suikoden (I've only been able to play Tierkreis). The characters are never one of those things.Suikoden is an excellent series, arguably more consistent than Final Fantasy, but the characters certainly aren't the strong point. There is a core cast of characters who are fairly strong but there are plenty of characters who are nothing more than placeholders.


It's still a major aspect of the genre - VI is not an exploration game.But it's not the only one like you've been making out. Furthermore, several characters' customisation actually have a substantially larger amount of depth than you're giving them credit for; the quests to fill out the abilities of characters like Gau and Stragos are quite involved and can take hours. It's not a mere matter of "just equip espers and kill trout".


Entirely false. The best characters to use are uncontestably Edgar, Sabin and Cyan. Their damage output far exceeds that of anyone else. Not even VIII compares to this level of brokenness (mostly because any character can be broken in it).Actually nearly any character in the game can be made into a powerhouse if you know how to use them correctly. Gau can be made to hit the damage limit ridiculously early if you learn the right Rages, Terra becomes a powerhouse in her own right once you get Morph, etc. Plus pure damage isn't the only reason to use a character; Runic can utterly defang some bosses and Setzer can destroy most enemies in a single hit if you know what you're doing (although admittedly this is due to a bug).


Murdered by PSICOM, does his story change?My point is that if you're going to criticise a character for allegedly flat characterisation, you should demonstrate that you actually understand the character. Leaving out a crucial part of Sabin's motivations is pretty glaring.

I also haven't played FFXIII so I can't actually answer this.


That isn't key to Red XIII's plot at all. He also has a direct relationship with Hojo, however wafer thin....who ran the experiments?


Addressed above.Where?


From a storytelling point, yes. But absolutely no one will argue that V's story comes off as anything other than "fun," at best.Well, no. It's also pretty clearly intended as a subtle deconstruction of some existing JRPG tropes. Regardless, it's a huge step down from FFIV's storytelling.

[Jinx]

This is why we can't have nice things.

[NeoCracker]

I'd also like to add you say only Ceres and Terra have a Fundemental relationship with the empire to drive the plot forward, but the same is true of FF VII and cloud and Aeirth. Red XIII and Cid could be dropped from the story entirely and the overall plot wouldn't change in the slightest.

I'd go into details on other FF's, but this is something that holds true for virtually every RPG ever made, not just the final Fantasy games. Very rarely are even half the casts necessary to drive the plot forward.

Hell, you have a game like Chrono Trigger who has what, one character with a direct relation to Lavos? And he's optional. As good as individual stories are among the cast, really none of their individual stories matter all that much in terms of the greater goal of the story. They are just a bunch of people who see the end of the world, and decide they should do what it takes to stop it. Not really anything more then that. And the story doesn't suffer in the slightest for it.

I guess in the end I fail to see how this is even a problem. So long as the plot can justify all the characters being there reasonably, I really don't take issue with it.

[The Man]

Beyond that, I'd say that kind of character development is just a necessary result of the plot simply not being very complicated. Most of the cast of FFVI have rather simplistic relations with the Empire and/or Kefka because the plot of the game is pretty straightforward. You're not going to get character relations like the ones in Game of Thrones in a SNES-era JRPG. Complaining about that is kind of missing the point.

Simple doesn't always mean bad.

[Carl the Llama]

The story: strangely devoid of plotholes for a Final Fantasy title.

I beg to differ, at the end of the world of balance Kefka has the power to call down this light of judgement (or w/e it was called) to make people disappear, yet some how the entire cast of over a dozen people are able to scale a fuck off huge mountain then proceed to have a fight with said "God" without him saying "You know what, fuck you eat death ray" coupled along side the fact that if they were able to scale the mountain at any time, why the hell didn't they kill Kefka right away??? It always baffles the fuck out of me when I play it.

I would also say that this is a pretty major plot hole.

[The Man]

The player characters are a smurfload more powerful than random NPCs, otherwise they wouldn't be able to take down Kefka either. The fact that they've (presumably) absorbed so much power through Magicite probably has a lot to do with it.

Not to mention they can't scale the mountain at any time; that's the whole reason they needed the airship. As soon as you get the airship you can beat the game at any time. It's pretty obvious the only reason they were able to ascend in the final battle was due to defeating the preceding tiers of monsters (since the game won't let you advance without doing so).

[Wolf Kanno]

The story: strangely devoid of plotholes for a Final Fantasy title.

I beg to differ, at the end of the world of balance Kefka has the power to call down this light of judgement (or w/e it was called) to make people disappear, yet some how the entire cast of over a dozen people are able to scale a smurf off huge mountain then proceed to have a fight with said "God" without him saying "You know what, smurf you eat death ray" coupled along side the fact that if they were able to scale the mountain at any time, why the hell didn't they kill Kefka right away??? It always baffles the smurf out of me when I play it.

I would also say that this is a pretty major plot hole.

You can make that argument against almost every final boss battle in the series though. Emperor Mateus comes back from the dead and unleashes the Makai realm on earth yet four orphans can beat him. Xande has enough magical power to darken the crystals and stop all time but gets his ass kicked by four orphans who then proceed to fight back a force of nature who curbstomped them all to death a few hours before the actual final battle. X-Death can destroy entire continents and sink islands even before he gained the power of the Void, Sephiroth's will is so great he can survive being torn apart by the Lifestream and reassembles himself absorbing enough power to no longer need materia to use magic and can summon a planet killer and mentally hold back the only counterspell at the same time. Ultimecia is powerful enough to meld time together into a single instance, Kuja destroyed a moon, Yu-Yevon is technically an immortal zombie who somehow gets perma-finished off after the Aeons are gone despite Seymour showing us that they can come back as much as they want... This might as well be the Final Fantasy Plot Hole considering how often if gets played in the series.

Besides, if you were a bored demigod, would you go all out from the beginning? Chances are Kefka overplayed his hand and underestimated the party, letting them get the upper hand cause he toyed with them more than he should have.

[Carl the Llama]

The player characters are a smurfload more powerful than random NPCs, otherwise they wouldn't be able to take down Kefka either. The fact that they've (presumably) absorbed so much power through Magicite probably has a lot to do with it.

Not to mention they can't scale the mountain at any time; that's the whole reason they needed the airship. As soon as you get the airship you can beat the game at any time. It's pretty obvious the only reason they were able to ascend in the final battle was due to defeating the preceding tiers of monsters (since the game won't let you advance without doing so).

They HAD an airship at the end of the world of Balance. As for you presumption, where is the evidence that suggests such a thing? I mean, it's entirely possible to go through the entire game with just relics and weapons so that theory just falls apart right there.




The story: strangely devoid of plotholes for a Final Fantasy title.

I beg to differ, at the end of the world of balance Kefka has the power to call down this light of judgement (or w/e it was called) to make people disappear, yet some how the entire cast of over a dozen people are able to scale a smurf off huge mountain then proceed to have a fight with said "God" without him saying "You know what, smurf you eat death ray" coupled along side the fact that if they were able to scale the mountain at any time, why the hell didn't they kill Kefka right away??? It always baffles the smurf out of me when I play it.

I would also say that this is a pretty major plot hole.

You can make that argument against almost every final boss battle in the series though.

I disagree. In VII you don't get to fight Sephiroth until key plot devices have been fulfilled (removal of the Barrier, finding Cloud, saving the huge materia and escaping from Junon (as you would need the Highwind to get to the North Cave, at which point you are able to face him), you don't have an opportunity to fight Sephiroth (the real Sephiroth) until the very end. In VIII Ultimercia uses Time Compression, the party make their way through that with another series of plot devices that have to be fulfilled (actually transcending time to be able to fight her) which isn't possible until you find Ellone ect. In IX you don't get to face Kuja till he reveals himself and his purpose and Garland throws a monkey wrench in his plan and that the party isn't strong enough till a certain point (the numerous times you were humbled by Beatrix each time it took less and less time to recover). In X you don't get to fight Yu-Yevon until other certain milestones are fulfilled (They believe the only way to kill Sin is to use the Final Summoning and it isn't revealed until the virtual end that they formulate a plan to kill him by other means.

In VI there was no major plot device that would have stopped them jumping onboard an airship (which could have easily been shot down by Kefka btw, yet another plot hole) and running up the mountain killing his chums along the way and then defeating the bastard himself.

[The Man]

They HAD an airship at the end of the world of Balance.Yes, but they very clearly couldn't kill Kefka at that point because he was in the field of the Statues, which protected him from harm. This is the same reason the Emperor absolutely failed to cause even the slightest bit of harm to him, and why Kefka was so easily able to dispose of him. If the party had attacked him at that point they would have been toast.

At other times of the game the party is unlikely to have been strong enough to have defeated him, and there are various plot devices in play that prevent a direct confrontation anyway (the party has to follow the espers or various other contrivances). Not to mention that most likely if they had engaged with him at that time he would simply have run away, as he did multiple times earlier in the game.


As for you presumption, where is the evidence that suggests such a thing? I mean, it's entirely possible to go through the entire game with just relics and weapons so that theory just falls apart right there.It's entirely possible, but the developers almost certainly assumed that nobody would bother doing that. In any case, even if the player has been running an esper-free game, Celes and Terra have natural magic (and Terra herself is half-Esper) and the player has almost certainly done a ridiculous amount of level grinding.

Not to mention some relics, weapons, and armour teach magic as well.


In VII you don't get to fight Sephiroth until key plot devices have been fulfilled (removal of the Barrier, finding Cloud, saving the huge materia and escaping from Junon (as you would need the Highwind to get to the North Cave, at which point you are able to face him), you don't have an opportunity to fight Sephiroth (the real Sephiroth) until the very end.None of this counteracts Wolf's argument about Sephiroth's strength, though. Similarly the other villians are equally overpowered and the game doesn't really give any real reason for the characters being able to defeat them other than "because they can".


In VI there was no major plot device that would have stopped them jumping onboard an airshipYes there was. I just addressed this.


(which could have easily been shot down by Kefka btw, yet another plot hole)Kefka was likely too arrogant to assume they could have done any harm to him. After all, he had absorbed the source of magic himself. He was, as far as he knew, a god. It's perfectly in line with his characterisation that he would prefer to cause the party as much misery as possible than to kill them instantly.

[Wolf Kanno]

I disagree. In VII you don't get to fight Sephiroth until key plot devices have been fulfilled (removal of the Barrier, finding Cloud, saving the huge materia and escaping from Junon (as you would need the Highwind to get to the North Cave, at which point you are able to face him), you don't have an opportunity to fight Sephiroth (the real Sephiroth) until the very end. In VIII Ultimercia uses Time Compression, the party make their way through that with another series of plot devices that have to be fulfilled (actually transcending time to be able to fight her) which isn't possible until you find Ellone ect. In IX you don't get to face Kuja till he reveals himself and his purpose and Garland throws a monkey wrench in his plan and that the party isn't strong enough till a certain point (the numerous times you were humbled by Beatrix each time it took less and less time to recover). In X you don't get to fight Yu-Yevon until other certain milestones are fulfilled (They believe the only way to kill Sin is to use the Final Summoning and it isn't revealed until the virtual end that they formulate a plan to kill him by other means.

In VI there was no major plot device that would have stopped them jumping onboard an airship (which could have easily been shot down by Kefka btw, yet another plot hole) and running up the mountain killing his chums along the way and then defeating the bastard himself.

You miss the point of the entire World of Ruin, the party tried to stop Kefka and they utterly failed most of the cast is too per-occupied with feeling sorry for themselves of dealing with personal business over stopping someone who has become a physical god of magic. The whole point of the second half is to overcome their own personal issues to finally regain the resolve needed to stop Kefka once and for all. In this case VI separates itself from the contrived plot elements of other FF games because instead having to do a series of quests to get rid of the magical obstacles in the parties way, they are instead dealing with a more personal issue and the games theme of trying to find hope in the deepest despair. The party tried and failed to stop Kefka, who knows what a second attempt would cause? The WoR is all about dealing with the mistakes they made and trying to find a reason to continue on. Most of the party members are utterly surprised when they discover each other so it's not like they all knew they were alive. After being nearly killed, watching the world end, and most likely helping to rebuild what is left of society, the party is too dispersed and downtrodden to just "storm the castle", It is a completely human response to the situation and didn't need some silly plot excuse to delay the final battle so the developers could make the game longer. FFVI's main themes are played the strongest in the game's second half where the player must see first hand all their effort has amounted up to and why the party has lost the will to fight.

You also are missing the point about Kefka's role in the WoR with your idea that "oh he could just shoot down the airship. It's a plot hole!". No because Kefka wants them to show up, his entire speech when the party meet him is one a host greeting his guest, not a viallin annoyed by interlopers cause unlike other villains, Kefka has already won. He became a god, ruled the world for a year, blew up the surface of the planet; his entire speech to the party is all about how despite his success, he is utterly bored. He decides to destroy everything and simply waits for them to finally show up to tell them cause it will give him one last thrill. He won't shoot down the airship cause he wants them to come, he doesn't try to stop the party cause he is banking on a final showdown, he's already achieved everything he wants and decided it wasn't worth it so what gain does he get for snuffing out the party too quickly?

[Bolivar]

Some of my favorite members in here doing their thing, but I just can't bring myself to read these long posts anymore. Least not for an overrated game like FFVI.

That's all I wanted to say, don't have anything to add to the discussion. Also, Wolf is wrong, the gameplay breaks itself and is horribly unbalanced with terrible challenge scaling.

[Lone Wolf Leonhart]

I don't think this game is overrated and I typically don't read into the reasons why someone would say it is.

As with Final Fantasy VII haters, it typically has less to do with the quality of the game itself and more to do with them wanting to feel unique by having an opinion that isn't popular. Not directed at anyone here (I have yet to read through this thread), I just mean as a general.

I just live by the idea that if you like a game, you like a game. And that's cool. Don't waste calories telling someone else why they shouldn't like it as much as they do.

[Sephex]

I don't think this game is overrated and I typically don't read into the reasons why someone would say it is.

As with Final Fantasy VII haters, it typically has less to do with the quality of the game itself and more to do with them wanting to feel unique by having an opinion that isn't popular. Not directed at anyone here (I have yet to read through this thread), I just mean as a general.

I just live by the idea that if you like a game, you like a game. And that's cool. Don't waste calories telling someone else why they shouldn't like it as much as they do.

http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/duty_calls.png

[Pumpkin]

Maybe it has less to do with wanting to look cool and more to do with just not enjoying a lot of other games

[Lone Wolf Leonhart]

Maybe it has less to do with wanting to look cool and more to do with just not enjoying a lot of other gamesWhich is why I said it was a generalization :monster:

[Pumpkin]

:ffvilaugh:

[Lone Wolf Leonhart]

You know what's objectively not overrated tho.

Suplexing a train.

[Pumpkin]

I agree with that 100%

[The Man]

MOTHERFUCKER SUPLEXED A TRAIN

[Ayen]

The Hancock movie would have been movie of the year if Will Smith had suplexed the train in that one scene.

[black orb]

>>> About as overrated as FF7..:luca:

Both are good games but they still overrated..

[WildRaubtier]

OH hey, some free time. WHERE TO START

[Sephiroth]

As with Final Fantasy VII haters, it typically has less to do with the quality of the game itself and more to do with them wanting to feel unique by having an opinion that isn't popular. Not directed at anyone here (I have yet to read through this thread), I just mean as a general.


I didn't know you're a General. Anyways, everything you said.

[Fatal Rose]

I'm having my first play through now. I noticed its the first game to go down the steam punk road. Due to the limits of the snes it's easy to miss how different the world is compared to earlier snes FF games. However upon close inspection you begin to notice how awesome and unique the setting is. Part medieval fantasy part steam punk. Really cool.

my personal preference is the more traditional medieval settings of the first five games though, FFVI settings still awesome though. I'm loving the characters so far, can't wait to get general Leo. I herd he's only in the game for one battle though, hope I'm wrong. The story is very interesting, the dialogue is decent too. I love the whole ensemble feel to the cast of player characters. The temp party members are also very interesting. I did not like those stupid mogs helping rescue terra in the beginning though. The music is awesome!

I think FFVII and FFVIII stray too far away from the fantasy setting into scifi/steam punk. I feel 6 is the perfect balance between the two. That's why I've had so much trouble getting into 7 and 8. FFX setting is also done better IMO when compared to 7 and 8.

I still need to finish the game though. Give me about a week and I'll be done.

[Colonel Angus]

VII & VIII aren't really steampunk, though. VII is more post-apocalyptic neo-futurist. VIII I really can't pinpoint. But, yeah, both are the farthest from a standard fantasy setting as FF had ever gotten (not considering XIII, as I know little about it).

[Formalhaut]

VII & VIII aren't really steampunk, though. VII is more post-apocalyptic neo-futurist. VIII I really can't pinpoint. But, yeah, both are the farthest from a standard fantasy setting as FF had ever gotten (not considering XIII, as I know little about it).

FFVIII is sort of semi-modern with real elements of futurism in there as well.

[BustaMo]

Disagree.

I think that since this game has been out for so many years, aside from die-hard FF fans, FFVI is underrated and gets a lot less love due to it being followed by the magnificant FFVII.

This game does fulfill all the greatness a Final Fantasy, let alone an RPG, game should have.

[Jiro]

VII & VIII aren't really steampunk, though. VII is more post-apocalyptic neo-futurist. VIII I really can't pinpoint. But, yeah, both are the farthest from a standard fantasy setting as FF had ever gotten (not considering XIII, as I know little about it).

FFVIII is sort of semi-modern with real elements of futurism in there as well.

Don't get too caught up in labels. I think you'll find "Fantasy" covers it pretty well. :ffviwave: